Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Danny Fabricius Fogel, Founder and CEO of Frontliners, located in Copenhagen, Denmark.

What's your business, and who are your customers?

It's our business to end bad customer service in retail, hospitality, and leisure. We do that with a SaaS platform that supports the full employee value chain and help the staff to excel.

Tell us about yourself

I'm a serial entrepreneur, and in 2017 my company, Promoters, worked with some of the world's largest brands, helping them demo and sample products to consumers. The expectations to the staff we provided for those demos and samplings were extremely high, and it was expected of the staff to deliver world-class service experiences and increase sales. To ensure that they delivered just that, we invented procedures to support recruiting, perfectly timed training, and motivation of the staff. When we succeeded, I just thought to myself that this was needed by everyone who has frontline staff, as there are so many bad service experiences happening every day. Imagine the increase in the number of smiling people we would have if everyone had great service experiences instead. That's why Frontliners was born, and that's what makes me love what I do.

What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?

Onboarding our first customer. It shows us that we build something that is useful for someone in real life. We have followed an idea and developed something that's extremely complex and extensive, so it's amazing to see someone use it.

What's one of the hardest things that come with being a business owner?

It's the ups and downs. I recently read the book The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz, where he refers to a talk he has with Marc Andreessen. It goes like this: "Do you know the best thing about startups?" - "What?" - "You only ever experience two emotions: euphoria and terror. And I find that lack of sleep enhances them both." I find this last quote to be spot on, and it's quite hard at some points.

What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?

  1. Just do it - don't wait, plan or find excuses for not doing it.
  2. Execution is king - it doesn't have to be perfect, but it has to be done.
  3. Don't give up - It will be hard, and you might lose faith in it at some point, but trust your idea and work through it with pivoting or whatever else is necessary. You will learn a lot along the way.

Is there anything else you'd like to share?

This summer, we meet behavioral economists John List, Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago, and Luigi Butera, Assistant Professor Of Economics at Copenhagen Business School, both founders of the Institute for Behavioral Economics. Together we are planning a collaboration set to understand the economics of customer service.

We are super excited about this collaboration, as John and Luigi are some of the most prominent and experienced scientists, and we are certain that they can set up experiments that will help us find ways to drive managers' and employees' behavior toward doing their utmost to deliver great service experiences. Just wanted to share this great news.

Where can people find you and your business?

Website: https://frontliners.ai/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danny-fabricius-fogel/


If you like what you've read here and have your own story as a solo or small business entrepreneur that you'd like to share, then please answer these interview questions. We'd love to feature your journey on these pages.

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